A student from Blaine was honored recently as the winner of the Human Rights Day poster contest in the Grades 9-12 category. The winner, Chandra, was recognized at a ceremony last month hosted by the Minnesota’s Commissioner of Human Rights, Velma Korbel. Chandra’s poster, entitled “Humanitarianism,” is now included in the 2008 human rights calendar, put out each year by the Minnesota Human rights collaborative.

Chandra is a senior at Blaine High School and is very excited about having her human rights poster published in the Human Rights Calendar. Her friend and art classmate also decided to enter the contest when they heard about it. To their surprise they both won! “I’ve never won anything with my art,” said Chandra. “In fact this is the first time I’ve ever entered an art contest.”

Her mother Melissa was not as surprised that Chandra won and stated “I encouraged Chandra to enter the contest and to do more with her art. I think she’s very good and I am excited and proud for her.”

Her goals in the near future are to go to the University of Minnesota and get a degree in psychology as well as art, which she eventually hopes will lead to becoming an art psychologist. The Human Rights Collaborative includes Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights, League of Minnesota Human Rights Commissions, Advocating Change Together, University of Minnesota Human Rights Center, Tolerance Minnesota, and Minnesota Department of Human Rights.

Participants were challenged to present in art form what they think the Human Rights Day theme quote from Marie Curie means in our society today: “You cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individual. To that end each of us must work for his own improvement, and at the same time share a general responsibility for all humanity, our particular duty being to aid those to whom we think we can be most useful.”